Authors: Keith Yocum
“But it’s so desolate,” he said. “If we were to break down right now, I don’t know how long we’d have to sit and bake in this car until someone came along to help us.”
“It wouldn’t be that bad. There’s enough traffic on the Northern Highway to help us out. It’s when you get off the paved highway that it gets dicey. And of course mobile phones don’t work so well out here, except in the towns.”
“But that’s where we’re headed, Judy, into the desert to look for our mining operation.”
“It’s your mining operation,” she said, “not mine. I’m just along for the ride.”
***
They spent the night in the Royal Mail Hotel in Meekatharra, another dusty town of tree-lined streets that appeared out of the desert like an accident. After dinner in the pub, they watched TV in their room. Judy tried to explain the rules of cricket as they watched a Test match against the Pakistani national team, but Dennis grew bored quickly. They made love almost as an afterthought: not the furious, alcohol-fueled passion of previous nights but a tender foray just as thrilling.
Judy listened to Dennis’s light snoring for a while before she fell into a fitful dream. In the dream her husband Phillip had suddenly moved back into their house, even though they had already divorced. Phillip acted imperious and nonchalant in the dream, which did nothing but infuriate her. Judy woke after only an hour and had trouble falling back asleep.
After a while Dennis stirred, wrapped his arm around her waist, and pulled her close. Within minutes she was sound asleep.
They pulled into Newton by 1:00 p.m.
“It looks just like Meekatharra,” Dennis said. “Are you sure this one-horse desert town isn’t the same one we just left? Did we circle back by accident?”
“Very funny, Yank. I’m sure there are towns like this in Texas, or whatever your big, flat, marvelously ugly States are.”
They checked in and Dennis, to Judy’s surprise, signed in as Dennis Smith.
They ate at the bar in the pub, and Judy leaned over at one point and asked, “Who is Dennis Smith?”
“Oh, I have three different credit cards; the Agency only knows about two of them. Or that’s what I’m hoping, anyway. And I have a fake US Passport for Dennis Smith. Found a guy in Bangkok three years ago who would do it for five thousand bucks. This guy could make a fake passport for sixty-three countries. Incredible. I did it on a lark, and I’m glad I did now.”
Tired from all of the driving, Dennis looked forward to a quick meal and a couple of drinks. To his disappointment, Judy started up a spirited conversation with the female bartender, dusting off her American-boyfriend tale. At one point Dennis visited the men’s room and then stepped outside the pub, where he was instantly assaulted by the heat. He guessed the temperature had fallen to about ninety-five degrees as the evening came on. The few stores strung out on the main street were closed; a traffic light blinked forlornly nearby, but no vehicles of any sort moved about. Two young boys on bicycles flew by in a mad rush, one of them grunting “G’day” to Dennis.
Entering the air-conditioned pub, he sauntered up next to Judy, and before he could pry her away from the animated conversation with the bartender, Judy grabbed his arm.
“Dear,” she said, “Maggie here says there are only a few mining operations right close to Newton, but none are worth visiting. She also said there’s a mysterious operation southeast of here—right, Maggie?”
Maggie and Judy giggled conspiratorially.
“Very hush-hush,” Maggie said.
“Hush-hush,” Judy repeated, looking at Dennis.
“What does that mean?” Dennis asked.
“It means secret, like a missile base, right, Maggie?”
“Oh, I’d say more secret than that, dearie,” Maggie said. “It’s been going on for at least a year, if not longer.”
“What makes the mine so secret?” Dennis asked.
“Maggie says that no locals work there; they have their own landing strip, and workers and supplies are flown directly into the mine. They have guards, right, Maggie?”
Dennis sat down on his stool, and Judy pinched him on his thigh. He patted her hand under the bar.
“But what do they do there?” Dennis asked.
“Oh, heaven knows,” Maggie said, “could be anything. But they’re not very friendly, I can tell you that. The Farrar twins were driving that way on four-wheelers and were just riding up and down the fence line when these fellers in big vehicles came out of nowhere and sent them on their way. Quite frightening, I gather. But we’re used to odd behavior out here, if you don’t mind me saying, and we don’t bother those folks, and they don’t bother us.”
***
Back in their little hotel room, Judy squealed.
“God, Judy,” Dennis said, shaking his head. “That was amazing. You did it!”
“Well, I can’t believe how it just fell into place,” she said.
He grabbed her shoulders and kissed her hard, lingering at the end until he needed to breathe.
“Jesus,” he said, “sometimes I feel like a high-school kid around you.”
“And what’s so distasteful about that?”
“Nothing at all; it’s just a little strange for an old, burned-out guy like me.”
“I keep telling you you’re not old and you’re certainly not burned out. Quit saying that, Dennis.”
He smiled and kissed her again.
Judy’s buoyant mood quickly turned dark as she realized what had just happened: the bartender confirmed Judy’s worst fear that Dennis’s trip into the outback was based on reality.
He pulled out their maps and notes and spread them on the bed. Judy glanced out hotel-room window into the black night of Newton, Western Australia.
“Dennis, I have to return to Perth the day after tomorrow,” she said. “Simon’s back in school and he begged me to attend a play he has a small part in. I promised him last week.”
“That’s fine,” Dennis said. “I’d feel a whole lot better if you weren’t here.”
“You’d be lost without me right now,” she said. “You haven’t the faintest idea about the bush.”
“You make it sound like we’re on Mars.”
“Worse, actually,” she said.
“Let’s see how things go tomorrow,” he said. “My guess is that’s all I’ll need. Just one day.”
***
They planned their foray into the outback like a troop of Boy Scouts; they compared Google Earth printouts and an Australian road directory. Judy was certain she could approximate the area they saw circled on the map Dennis got from Langley.
“We drive down this dirt track here. My guess is that damn thing is out there,” Dennis said, pointing to an area southeast of Newton.
They had breakfast of fried eggs, toast, and huge fat thumbs of Australian breakfast sausage. Judy had lathered herself with sunblock, but Dennis declined.
“We’re not getting out of the car, so why should we put that on?”
“It’s the bush, Dennis,” she said. “You never know what’s going to happen.” Judy also made sure they filled a five-gallon plastic water container in the back of the vehicle. She wore shorts, a white blouse, and took along a wide-brim hat that she folded in her purse.
Dennis was troubled by the barren landscape as they followed a well-worn dirt road away from Newton.
Numerous dirt roads around Newton seemed to crisscross the rugged red-brown landscape like a spider’s web. Dennis had thought, at least from the Google Earth maps, the primary driving routes into the desert would be obvious.
At ground level it was not clear which track to take. Even on what looked like a heavily traveled dirt road, many parallel tracks wove through the primary road like strands of a rope.
They pulled over and reviewed the maps again. After several minutes of discussion they agreed to keep following the current track as it moved southeast.
Judy felt stupid for not bringing a hand-held GPS; she had thought of virtually everything else.
After an hour of driving through the dusty tire tracks, Judy turned to Dennis.
“Dennis, please don’t be angry, but this doesn’t seem like a good idea. We’re getting deeper into the bush, and we’ve only seen two hand-drawn signs pointing to a sheep station that may no longer exist. It seems even more desolate than I expected. It’s really dangerous out here. If we blow a tire or overheat the engine, they might not find us for a while.”
“I can certainly take you back, if you like,” he said. “You know it was never my idea to bring you out here.”
“No, Dennis,” she persisted. “I’m talking about you as well. Let’s just turn around and rethink this thing. Remember, these blokes don’t want to be discovered. You said so yourself. We could get lost out here. I think it’s even more dangerous if you’re by yourself. You don’t seem to appreciate the desolation here.”
Dennis slowed the vehicle to a stop. The dust trail following them briefly covered the LandCruiser in a murky, maroon veil.
“Judy, I can’t just quit. Not now. We’re very close to this thing. Why don’t I just turn around and drop you off at the hotel? I’ll be back later today.”
She sighed and looked out the tinted passenger-side window.
“Fine. Let’s keep going. Besides, you’re helpless by yourself out here.”
Dennis drove off again.
***
After two hours of driving, Dennis had more or less picked up the knack for driving at a relatively high speed of forty-five miles per hour. He quickly learned to slow down at the bottom of a dip in the trail where they’d fishtail through a deep silt-sand mixture.
They continued farther into the desert, passing identical scraggy bushes and mounds of spinifex grass balls and spires. At one point, Judy pointed ahead to a low dust cloud that seemed to be getting closer.
Twenty minutes later, as if it were an apparition, a small, dust-coated pick-up truck roared past them in the opposite direction heading, presumably, for Newton. The Aboriginal driver honked his horn, waved, and was gone, spewing an outback dust trail in his wake.
Dennis tried to pay attention to visual markers: a low rise of weather-worn hills to the north, a strange outcropping of brown stone nearly straight ahead.
At one point, Judy yelped with glee when she saw two emus fifty yards from the road. “I’ve never seen one in the wild,” she said. “Just in the zoo.”
The tall, ostrichlike birds stared idly as they drove by.
“You don’t get out much, do you?” Dennis said.
“Oh, stop it. How many American bison have you seen in the wild?”
“Um, let me count. One, two, um, three. Actually, none.” Dennis laughed.
“Very funny, Yank.”
Dennis couldn’t help but notice strange bits of flotsam and jetsam tossed to the side of the track, including car batteries, a rusting car fender, two empty and nearly oxidized fifty-five-gallon barrels, and the occasional degraded beer or soft-drink can.
After forty-five minutes Dennis stopped, and they consulted their hodgepodge of road maps and Google Earth printouts.
“I think we should have found something by now,” Dennis said. “There’s nothing here but dirt. We’ll need to turn around soon to get back by sunset.”
Judy reached into her bag in the back seat and pulled out a set of binoculars. Without saying a word she got out of the car, went around to the front, climbed gingerly onto the hot hood, and scanned 360 degrees of the horizon. Dennis turned off the car and got out to talk to her and was again stunned by the heat. Looking up at her, he shielded his eyes from the sun.
“See anything?”
“Not much. Just a little bump or something there.” She pointed about thirty degrees to the left.
“What is it?”
“Don’t know. Could be a man-made structure—or a rock outcropping. Should we check it out?”
“Sure,” Dennis said. “I see what you meant about being prepared out here. If this car breaks down, we’re in trouble.”
They continued driving down the track. Both drained their water bottles.
After another twenty minutes, on the left side of the road they saw a four-foot-high barbed-wire fence. Every twenty feet or so, small white metal signs stated: Keep Out—Private Property.
Judy noticed the fence was not engineered to keep game in or out; there were two strands of barbed wire on the metal star posts. The top strand was about two feet from the other strand. A kangaroo could easily jump the fence, a dingo could slip through the strands, and a human could step through effortlessly. The fence seemed to simply be a warning for humans not to enter.
Dennis pulled the LandCruiser off the track into the bush to his left and followed the fence line into desert, perpendicular to the dirt track. He wove delicately around and over clumps of spinifex. They could see nothing inside the fence line except more desert.
Judy convinced Dennis to stop. She climbed onto the hood again and this time hustled gingerly onto the roof. Dennis got out and walked over to the fence.
“Nothing outside the fence, nothing inside the fence,” he said. “Plenty of nothing.”
“Dennis, you should see this,” Judy said.
“What is it?”
“I’m not sure, to be honest.”
Dennis scampered up the hood of the vehicle, its warmth adding to the stultifying atmosphere.
With the roof of the Cruiser indenting slightly from their weight, Dennis spread his legs so that his weight was over the sturdier edges. He took the binoculars and looked in the direction Judy had pointed.
In the distance, perhaps a mile into the fenced-off area, he could see a thin sheen of whitish dust and several large mounds of grayish soil. Scanning to his right, he could just make out the top of a corrugated metal roof.
“Some kind of operation out there,” he said, returning the binoculars. “Looks like a mining operation. This could be were our boys are.”
They climbed down the Cruiser, their palms burning from the vehicle’s heat. Dennis quickly turned on the engine and shoved the air conditioner on high. He noticed Judy’s cheeks were a soft pink.
“You OK?” he asked.
“Yes, why?”
“You look hot. Your face is red.”
“Well, it’s bloody hot out there, Dennis,” she said.
They retraced their path back to the dirt track and stopped. The sun was now on the other side of its arc, and Dennis guessed they had about five hours of sunlight left. He had a little more than half a tank of gas.